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than following the road of good manners. Therefore it was necessary to treat them with cruelty and absolute severity, to make everyone understand where the path of disobedience to the traditions could lead. He added:
    â€˜Anyway, why do they pretend to be American blacks and not, say, North Koreans or Palestinians? I’ll tell you why: this is filth that comes from the devil, through the television, the cinema, the newspapers and all the trash that a worthy and honest person never touches . . . America is a cursed, godforsaken country, and everything that emanates from it must be ignored. If these fools play at being Americans, soon they’ll be whooping like monkeys instead of talking . . .’
    Grandfather Kuzya hated everything American because, like all Siberian criminals, he opposed what represented power in the world. If he heard anyone talk about people who had fled to America, of many Jews who had made a mass exodus from the USSR in the 1980s, he would say in amazement:
    â€˜Why on earth does everyone go to America, saying they seek freedom? Our ancestors took refuge in the woods, in Siberia, they didn’t go to America. And besides, why flee from the Soviet regime, only to end up in the American one? It would be like a bird that had escaped from its cage going voluntarily to live in another cage . . .’
    For these reasons, in Low River it was forbidden to use anything American. The American cars which circulated freely all over town couldn’t enter our district, and items of clothing, domestic appliances and all other objects that were ‘made in the USA’ were banned. For me personally this rule was rather painful, since I was very keen on jeans but I couldn’t wear them. I secretly listened to American music – I liked blues, rock and heavy metal, but I was taking a big risk in keeping the records and cassettes in the house. And when my father carried out an inspection of my hiding places and finally found them, all hell would break loose. He would beat me and make me break all the records with my own hands in front of him and my grandfather, and then every evening for a week I would be made to play Russian tunes on the accordion for an hour and sing Russian folk or criminal songs.
    I wasn’t attracted by American politics, only by the music and by the books of some writers. Once, choosing the right moment, I tried to explain this to Grandfather Kuzya. I hoped that he would be able to intercede and give me permission to listen to the music and read American books without having to hide from my family. He looked at me as if I had betrayed him and said:
    â€˜Son, do you know why when there’s an outbreak of the plague people burn everything that belonged to the victims?’
    I shook my head. But I already imagined where this was leading.
    He gave a sad sigh and concluded:
    â€˜The contagion, Nikolay, the contagion.’
    And so, since everything American was forbidden, just as it was forbidden to flaunt wealth and power through material things, the people of our district dressed very humbly. We boys were in a terrible state as far as clothing was concerned, but we were proud of it. We wore like trophies our fathers’ or elder brothers’ old shoes, and their unfashionable clothes, which were meant to emphasize Siberian humility and simplicity.
    We could have enjoyed life to the full. We were an ancient and very wealthy community, the houses in our area were huge, the people could have lived ‘in grand style’, as the phrase is in our country and in yours, but instead money was used in a strange way: no clothes, jewels, expensive cars, gambling. There were only two things the Siberians were happy to spend their money on: weapons and Orthodox icons. We all had an enormous quantity of weapons, and also of icons, which were very costly.
    In all other respects we were humble – humble and in uniform. In winter we all wore quilted trousers – black